Here are some terms you can use with your students to create a common language for the classroom.


Blogosphere: the collective content of the blogs worldwide, taken as a whole. The terms may also refer to the subculture of the community as well as referring to the social network that the bloggers build.

Blogroach: A commenter on a blog who obnoxiously disagrees with any and everything posted, and does it as rudely as possible.

Blogstipation: The condition of being unable to think of anything to post on a blog.

Blogstorm: A large spike in activity, in terms of posting in the blogosphere, centering around a particular subject or controversy either online or offline.

Crud: Code that unintentionally appears within the body of a blog post, instead of applying whatever formatting or action it was intended to perform.

Dark Blog: A blog that is unavailable to the public, often hidden behind a firewall or registration barrier.

Flame: To post a hostile comment, often directed personally to another commenter or blogger and generally deliberately inflammatory or insulting. Flames are not meant to be constructive, add to a discussion, or persuade other commenters of a position.

Journal Blog: The most common form of a blog, usually presented as a personal diary or journal.

Linguablog: A blog that focuses on linguistics, translations, languages, or other language-related subjects.

Link: Using hypertext, a link is selectable connection from one work, picture, or information object to another.

Lurker: A reader of a blog who never comments or otherwise indicates his or her presence.

Netiquette: Etiquette for the Internet.

Post: A single unit of content on a blog, usually consisting of at least a title and text. A blog is made up of a collection of posts.

Thread: A series of posts on a specific topic.

Troll: A contributor to an online discussion whose purpose in posting is primarily to generate intense debate, often with intentionally inflammatory rhetoric.

Vlog: A video blog.


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